Three Things

The grilled chicken dinner I made twice last week, Spaghett cocktails, a big summer book hits the shelves

Greetings eaters and readers! Hope you all had a great holiday. As is customary this time of year, a pitcher of the world’s best gazpacho has taken permanent residence in my fridge, and last week I had some with smashed garlicky white beans toasts and a drizzle of pesto, maybe the most on-point summer dinner I can remember. (These recipes are all in the first Weekday Vegetarians, which, as you know already, is jammed with ideas for simple summer eating.) Also, wanted to quickly remind you that from now until July 15, I’m offering a 20% discount to new subscribers. Paying subscribers have access to all past dinner party menu plans and Monday-to-Friday meal plans on the home page of my newsletter (right side of the page, under “Featured”), plus behind-the-scenes dispatches about cookbook-making and my new apartment. Not to mention opportunities to partake in recipe contests (deadline for entries is today btw!) and an upcoming book talk with the novelist Catherine Newman on August 7. Click here to redeem your offer»

THANK YOU and a huuuge thank you to those of you who already support the operation, it means a lot! And now, your Three Things…

1. Your Summer Menu of the Week

It’s not summer in our house until we grill up some yogurt-marinated chicken, which we managed to do twice last week, and both of those times I was reminded how low-effort/high-reward the recipe is, especially when you’re cooking for a large group. Those of you who have been here a while are probably familiar with our Lemon-Pepper Yogurt-Marinated Chicken, which we’ve been making for decades, but for this version, I added a little turmeric and cilantro to the marinade, setting some of it aside to double as a drizzling sauce. Garam masala also works nicely as a spice swap-in for the turmeric.

Spiced-Yogurt-Marinated Grilled Chicken
Serves 6

1 1/2 cups plain yogurt
2 large handfuls chopped cilantro (stems are fine)
1 clove garlic
1 bunch (about 4-5) scallions (white and light green parts)
Juice from 1 lemon
1 tablespoon honey
1/4 cup olive oil
2 teaspoons turmeric (or curry powder)
1/2 teaspoon cumin
kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 pounds chicken breasts (pounded) or thighs (no need to pound)

In a bowl or a blender whisk or whirl yogurt, cilantro, garlic, scallions, lemon juice, honey, olive oil, turmeric (or curry powder), cumin, salt and pepper until emulsified. (If you are not using a blender, make sure your cilantro, garlic, and cilantro are all chopped finely.) Reserve about 3/4 cup, then pour the remaining sauce into a zip-top bag (or a shallow bowl) drop in the chicken, mush around until coated, and seal (or cover with plastic wrap). Refrigerate for a minimum of 3 hours, flipping the chicken around once or twice during the marinating. When the grill is ready (and oiled), cook chicken pieces over medium-high heat about 4-5 minutes a side until flesh is firm but not rock hard. Serve, drizzled with reserved sauce.

And on the side…

For a Spring Pea Salad, I lightly simmered some snow peas and shelled fresh peas for 2 minutes, dunked them in an ice bath, then drained and tossed them with pea shoots, mint, radishes, and avocado. (There was a little leaf in there to stretch it out, but not a lot.) The dressing is this green goddess dip, thinned out with a few more tablespoons of water. For the Fried Potatoes, Andy par-boiled some halved Yukon golds (reds would be fine, too) for about 8 minutes, then fried them in a good amount of vegetable oil with salt and pepper right on the grill in a cast-iron skillet. Easier than potato salad and keeps the kitchen a little cooler on a hot day.

Related: Last month’s Vegetarian Summer Menu of the Week

2. Have You Tried a Spaghett Cocktail?

I asked my instagram followers this exact question last week, and maybe it will surprise you to hear that the breakdown was: 26% YES, 74% NO. In spite of the Spaghett being one of the trendier drinks of the past few summers (Alex Delaney declared it the drink of the season in 2019), I was in the NO column myself until last weekend, when my brother-in-law, Tony, handed me a bottle. I have to assume that a lot of the appeal lies in the ease of its preparation. To make a Spaghett, you take a hearty swig from a bottle of Miller High Life, then drizzle in an ounce of Aperol (shown above) and a squeeze of lemon. That’s it. The result is a refreshing, sunset-colored, low-alcohol cocktail that seems like the right vibe for an afternoon cookout. Personally, I’d choose a regular Aperol spritz over this one, but I would definitely not discount the conversation value you get from the name — I so wish the drink was named after a regular in some dimly-lit, checkered-tableclothed Italian restaurant off the Jersey turnpike with a cigarette machine in its entrance, but it was actually inspired by a character in the Adult Swim show “Tim and Eric Awesome Show: Good Job.” Who knew?! What do we think? Yay or nay on the Spaghett?

3. Book Pick: Long Island Compromise

I’ve been waiting for so long to tell you about Taffy Brodesser-Akner’s latest novel, Long Island Compromise, which I read in a few heart-racing sessions back in April, and which is officially out in the world today. The opening line of the book — “Do you want to hear a story with a terrible ending?” — should give you a sense of how off-to-the-races we are right from the start: Carl, the patriarch of a wealthy Jewish family living in the fictional town of Middle Rock on Long Island, is kidnapped in his own driveway, then returned drenched in vomit and filth a few days later after his family pays a $250,000 ransom. In spite of his mother’s and his wife’s determination to erase the trauma (It happened to your body, not to you, they say to Carl in desperation throughout his life) we get to see exactly how painful that legacy of trauma plays out in the lives of his three children: Beamer, a hanger-on Hollywood screenwriter who fetishizes kidnapping in his scripts and his sex life; Nathan, a comically neurotic, wracked-with-anxiety lawyer, whose favorite bedtime story to read to his young children is “Have You Really Thought This Through?” about all the terrible things that can happen if you’re not paying attention; and Jenny, the prodigy, the one with all the promise who ends up at Yale, but can’t do much of anything in the real world except resent (and destroy) her wealth and privilege. “I think that every family is its own Bible story,” the narrator writes. “Every family is its own mythology. The people that were written about in the Torah — that’s just a document from a period of time. If the Torah had gone on, perhaps we’d all be included in it.” I am such a sucker for an epic family saga — it’s hard not to compare this book to Jonathan Franzen’s The Corrections, or even the show Succession — and if you’ve read Fleishman Is in Trouble, you know how electric Brodesser-Akner’s writing is, how smart and dark and observant and hilarious it is. I’m giving this book to everyone I know. PS: What a cover!

*PLEASE NOTE: Here is another book where I need to issue a full disclosure! My husband is Taffy’s editor, so please do your own due diligence — I suggest this New York Times review and this one in the LA Times — if you are suspicious that my extreme enthusiasm is biased.

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